anchor cast below
by AlyssaLucyAnne
Summary: A post-ep for 6x23 "For better or for worse" A glance into the aftermath, as well as a reunion.


**anchor cast below**

* * *

_You'll be balance when I waver.__  
__I'll be warmth when you are shivering cold.__  
__You'll be patience when I've had enough of this waiting game.__  
__I'll be the anchor cast below._

- Sleeping at last, Tethered

* * *

**To Patri**

* * *

He's alive. He's alive. He's alive.

The words have become her mantra, keep resonating through her mind and heart and to be honest, most of the time they are the only thing that keep her going.

He's alive.

she knows it's not necessarily the truth. That quite possibly he is not.

But she forces her mind to stay away from those thoughts. Forces herself to hold onto that brittle illusion because the mere thought of him gone makes her feel as if she were dying too. As if the oxygen in the air wasn't anough and her heart slowly falling apart and so she keeps on telling herself

He's alive.

He's alive.

Because without it she doesn't know how to breathe.

Of course she sees the worried looks on all of their faces. Espo, Ryan Gates, the entire bullpen. She has seen them ever since the phone call in the Hamptons, has seen them when they arrived at the scene after her and has seen them when they were told he wasn't in the car, and she has seen them every day, every hour and she sees them now.

They are there, their collective stares, as soon as she enters the precinct. Looks of pity that tell her how deep she has already fallen.

She pretends to function somehow. Goes through the day. Investigates his case mostly.

She doesn't dare to tell anyone that the pit of the chasm is way further down and that she is falling and falling and doesn't know how to hold on to the edges anymore, that the blackness surrounding her now is a light gray in comparison to what she feels clawing and clenching at her heart and soul, threatening to drag her even further.

Down, down, down.

She feels the demons wrenching at her slender body at night, feels them tearing at his shirts that surround her with warmth and his familiar scent and they whisper in her ear, icy breath and ghostly claws on her skin.

"He's gone, Kate" and she cries and she screams and she knows she is scaring Martha and Alexis but she can't leave the loft.

She can't leave the only place that still makes her feel like he is with her, like at any moment he is going to sneak up on her, wrap his arms around her waist and whisper a sweet "I love you" in her ear.

She barely manages to sleep anymore, her dreams haunted by his face and the nightmares are still the best dreams she gets.

Because the worst, the absolute worst dreams are those where they get married. Those dreams that remind her how happy it would have been, how perfect; how close she had gotten to have it actually happen, and how it did not.

Because when she wakes up the bed is empty, the sheets untouched and he isn't there and she usually runs to the toilet to heave out the little amount of food she has eaten during the last day.

She misses him to a point where his absence actually physically hurts. She wonders how it is even possible.

How the hell is it possible for nothing to hurt so much? But she feels the hole in her heart and the emptiness tugging at her soul and the desperate numbness that has replaced the joy and happiness he had brought to her swallowing her whole.

And she has no idea how to fix this.

She needs him. She needs him for all of this.

She needs him to walk next to her when they enter the precinct's elevator. She needs him to occupy the empty chair next to her desk. She needs him to smile at her, with that expression that makes her heart blossom. She needs him to touch her and hold her and chase the cold in her chest away. But most of all she needs his words, his words that make the ghosts shut up and that make her believe that she is invincible. That everything is going to be okay.

* * *

She thinks about this thought experiment a lot lately. It's something she and Castle once discussed when he was telling her his plot ideas. Schrödinger's cat. Both alive and dead until the box is opened and she can't help but make this about him now.

Before, she had never quite supported the theory, thinking that you can't be both, dead and alive.

Castle had obviously been delighted and argued that of course it's possible. And he had been right, and now he is.

Alive and dead. Equally.

And the not knowing is deadly.

It's been three weeks since the wedding. Three weeks she was supposed to spend on a magical island with her husband. Three weeks she has spent alone instead, wandering between the precinct and home, barely even part of this life anymore, numb and empty, barely even a part of this life anymore. And with every day that passes, every second she spends without him, the hope inside her heart starts to fade a little bit more.

It still hurts to be without him. It hurts even more now. And she feels like she is drowning, every gasp of breath a battle for her life, every heartbeat uncertain. And it is hard. Just so hard to keep going when there is nothing to go on.

She fastens up her white blouse, her trembling fingers making it harder to fiddle the small buttons through the loops and she feels fresh tears pooling in her eyes.

This wasn't supposed to be this hard. She can't even get dressed without the fear of collapsing and quite frankly it scares her to even think about what would happen if she actually found out that he was dead.

She feels her phone vibrating in her pockets, pulls it out while simultaneously grabbing the file of information regarding the accident she has put together on her desk.

She moves towards the front door, already on her way out as she glaces at the caller ID to finally answer the call. Her knees buckle, almost send her spiraling down to the floor and she feels her heart beating so clearly, the pumping so loud in her head that she is actually scared it might burst out of the confines of her body.

It's Castle.

Her fingers almost drop the phone, trying hard to hit the accept button, yet trembling and shaking so hard, it takes three tries before she finally succeeds.

"Castle?" Her voice quivers upon saying his name out loud. She sounds a little breathless, gasping and terribly unlike her previous self.

"Kate" he breaths. It is so unmistakably him, and she feels the sob escaping her throat upon hearing his voice. His familiar, low voice that with only one word manages to soothe the pain in her chest.

"Where are you? Castle where are you?"

* * *

She clings to him. Arms around his back, fingernails dug into the texture of his shirt, firm and strong and unwavering. Savoring every piece of his presence; his arms around her, his heartbeat, the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, alive and steady.

They haven't let go of their hold on each other since she had found him in that building. He had looked so lost, like a small puppy at a highway, bruised cheeks and ruffled hair, but so very much alive and she had held onto him ever since; when the paramedics had checked him out, on their way home in the cab, and in the security of their bed at home. No intetntions of ever letting him go again.

She still doesn't know what happened. Only fragments of a story that involves Tyson and his father and she knows that tomorrow they will have to deal with this, but for right now she is content to just be in his strong arms and let the world wait.

He is here.

He is alive.

She's not alone.

She notices the trembling in her body, the slow shakes that steadily grow stronger as the tension starts leaving her body. She doesn't realize she has started crying until she notices the wetness on his shirt, but then again, did the tears ever really stop?

He holds her tighter when the sobbing starts. Sobs that wreck her entire being, that crawl up her throat and spill out of her mouth as desperate cries that make his own tears drop from his eyes again.

And through it all he holds her. Palms spread out at her back, arms tightly wound around her slender frame, keeping her as close as possible as he strokes her hair and back and whispers quiet words into her ear. Silent promises. Over and over. Until they are branded on her heart.

"I'm here"

"I'm okay"

"It's all okay"

"I'm so sorry"

"It's okay"

And his breath is on her skin and his lips wander from her ear into her hair, breathing kisses to every piece of her being until the trembles subside and the sobs are reduced to small whimpers. She presses herself further into his chest, breathes him in, all of him. Not the drips and draps of his scent she has clung to over the past couple of weeks. And she finally feels her chest expanding again, the air actually filling her up as she learns to breathe again.

"I thought you were dead" she can't even hear the words herself, so silent, so broken. But he tucks her into himself closer, starts running his fingers up and down along her spine again, relishes every vertebra underneath his fingertips, draws slow circles around each and every one of them as if they were a miracle.

"So did I for a while" she hears the grief in his voice and she doesn't know what he went through yet, but she knows that she is going to do everything in her power to erase this echoes of pain and tragedy from his voice forever.

She looks up at him then, at his blue, and oh so comforting eyes and then his lips are on hers. They are chapped and dry and wonderful, tasting of love and peace and promises and she scoots up a bit to press into him even further. It's desperate and hard, and it is slow and it is comforting and it is her breath intermingled with his and they both gasp for air when they finally break apart.

She feels the smile on her lips, mirroring the one on his and she closes her eyes as his fingertips start tracing the contours of her her face.

His other hand still holds her close and she feels the need for sleep pulling at her, begging her to just let herself rest.

"Sleep Kate, I'll be right here"

And she knows that after three weeks she finally can. He is here. She knows she is going to have nightmares, and he will probably too. But she also knows that when she wakes up, her life won't be one anymore and there will be someone next to her, to chase the ghosts away.

* * *

**AN: **Basically written to deal with my emotions. I know it wasn't very good but I hope it was okay and good luck getting through the hiatus everybody!

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twitter: AlyssaLucyAnne


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